Bird droppings can be mosquito busters!

July 23, 2014 - 8:58:57 am

Bangalore: Don’t get upset if birds mess up your courtyard or your home garden with their droppings. These winged creatures may actually be helping to protect you and your family from dengue and other mosquito-borne diseases.

Researchers at the Vector Control Research Centre (VCRC) in Pondicherry have discovered that bird droppings contain certain bacteria that kill mosquitoes.

They say they are now working to develop a formulation based on bird droppings for mosquito control.

“Mosquitocidal bacteria are environmental friendly alternatives to chemical insecticides,” says their report published in the Indian Journal of Experimental Biology.

“Therefore, there have been efforts worldwide to identify such bacteria from the natural environment,” the report says.

Because wild birds consume food from a variety of environmental sources like soil, water, fruits and decaying animals, VCRC scientists decided to look for potential mosquito killing bacteria in the bird droppings, the findings in the report said.

And they did not have to go too far to get the stuff. According to their report, they collected droppings from 1,000 different locations in the tree garden in the institute’s own premises.IANS